Military Monitoring Impact On Archaeological Sites

Archaeologists have teamed up with military veterans and local volunteers to try to discover whether military activity on Salisbury Plain has had an impact on archaeological sites, which date back as far as the sixth century.

The Ministry of Defence has set up a programme and provided funding in the form of the Conservation Stewardship Fund to evaluate the effects on ground pressure cause by military vehicles. 

Talia Hunt is an archaeologist working on the area and says: "We've found generally that they haven't been overly impacted.

"There's a couple that were directly underneath the track and they seem to have survived reasonably well, even though they're not that much under the soil."

Operation Nightingale is a project that was established jointly by the Defence Infrastructure Organisation and the Rifles Regiment, which sees ill and injured service personnel and veterans assisting archaeologists with excavations on the MoD estate.

Richard Osgood from the Defence Infrastructure Organisation, said: "It's quite an emotional thing in many ways, finding these bodies and also for a soldier if you're finding someone with a shield, sword, a spear - it's a warrior so people from 1500 years ago being excavated by warriors of the 21st century - it's a really nice link.

"You think the weight of some of these vehicles must be damaging (the skeleteons) but it really isn't, it's a real curiosity."

One veteran benefiting from the work is Christopher Conlin, he said: "The hardest parts of recovery is the hidden part, it's more the pyschological (part) and you can lock yourself away because you don't feel like you fit in.

"This place is the complete opposite, everyone fits in, it's a great atmosphere.

"It gives you a mission, almost like you were back in the Army when you did have those objectives that you had to achieve.

"You make your own objectives here  and you achieve them and you've got the help and support of everyone around you."

Also part of the excavation work is Breaking Ground Heritage, which was set up for serving and ex-serving personnel by veteran Dickie Bennett.

He said the project can have a big impact on someone going through recovery: "A lot of people on this project in particular have withdrawn from the military community like I did.

"By getting them back to a safe environment, one they recognise, it enables them to open up again.

"It enables them to  be the person they once were, to start thinking about the future again." 

The latest excavation has been taking place on Salisbury Plain at a site known as at Barrow Clump, where the team have been unearthing the remains of sixth-century Anglo-Saxon graves.